The Arctic Incident Code (rewrite)

Below is the rewrite code from “Artemis Fowl: The Arctic Incident” decoded into English. The code is originally written in Gnommish.

The Code

One of the strangest creatures on the earth (or more accurately below it) is the common stinkworm. Stinkworms can only survive below the earth’s crust and so have never been seen by humans. The stinkworm can grow to a length of fifteen centimetres and a diameter of up to eight centimetres.

The bigger a stinkworm is the more meat there is on its soft boned skeleton and the more valuable it is to a merchant. Stinkworms are big business in the fairy world and have been for thousands of yeats. They are very versatile creatures and can be boiled, fried, baked or even eaten raw – though this sushi approach can be difficult to swallow as the stink associated with the worms does not disappear until they are cooked. The current favourite way to eat the stinkworm is in a dish similar to bolognese, substituting stinkworms for spaghetti. Deep fried on a skewer is popular among the younger generation.

What makes the stinkworm so delicious is its juices. When the worm is heated in a pan or oven it bastes itself in a delicious spicy juice which even the best chefs have failed to reproduce. This juice is in fact earwax from the hundreds of ears that cover each worm’s body. Some more sensitive fairies cannot forget that they are eating earwax and do not enjoy eating stinkworms, but most are so entranced by the flavour that they are quite prepared to ignore where it comes from.

Goblins in particular love stinkworms and are constantly inventing new ways to consume them. The rarest and most prized stinkworm dish is a stir fried bowl of stinkworm ears. The ears are shaved from the worm’s body, rolled in flour and then lightly fried. This dish takes hours to prepare and costs a fortune. Goblins believe that if you eat a bowl of worm ears then you absorb the worm’s memories of the places they have visited. This is not an appealing thought when you consider that a stinkworm’s favourite environment is fresh troll dung.